


Dying to Live Again

by wantadonut



Series: Long Live Us [1]
Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-26
Updated: 2013-03-26
Packaged: 2017-12-06 13:01:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/736007
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wantadonut/pseuds/wantadonut
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Grantaire wakes up after the final battle. He finds pain and he finds blood but there's hope, even for the cynic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dying to Live Again

Grantaire woke up to nothing. He doesn't even remember falling asleep and the thing is: he hadn't intended to wake up.

So he notices the silence as soon as his eyelids are open and he keeps looking towards the café's ceiling. He feels nothing. Not wind, not a pat on the shoulder when a comrade passes him by. 

There's no one glaring at him. He's a hundred percent sure of that. And it makes him feel empty and hollow and he wants to stand up but he’s is afraid. 

And he's not ashamed of it. He has never denied it and won't ever try to. He drinks himself until he's numb so he can avoid reality. Because the real world hurts.

Right now, though, he feels numb even though he's sober. Because if there's something that can break a man, is loneliness. 

He takes a deep breath and he tries to ignore the iron taste that comes through his nostrils and he pants, because it's too much, it's too fucking much. But he stands up and when he does, he sees red. There's a lump in his throat and a stone in his stomach. 

One of his hands pulls at his own hair, because pinching himself won't work, so maybe, maybe losing a few strands of curly hair will make him wake up. When he looks at the palm of his hands and finds not only hair but his skin colored in red, he's almost sure that the blood is his own but he throws up nonetheless. 

It does not help. It does not help, because he looks up from where he's standing and he sees them. And he cries. 

Éponine is looking at the ceiling but her eyes are dead. She is dead. And Gavroche, oh my god, Gavroche is next to her and he has ammunition in his hand and a flag patch on the other. 

Grantaire doesn't move. He can't get closer. He takes long breaths and he runs. He goes upstairs, because he can find comfort there, he has to. He steadies himself with a hand on one of the walls next to the stairs and he starts climbing. He tries to tell himself that this isn’t true, he didn't just jump over a body on one of the stair's steps. It's all in his head. 

The Musain's stairs shrieks but he only hears the beating of his own heart. The silence is shattering him slowly, each step he takes. 

When he reaches the second floor, he thinks his heart is going to stop and he is grateful, he is so grateful, he is so ready to go. 

But it's not his lucky day. It is a red and deathly and painful twilight.

Combeferre and Joly are lying on the floor, surrounded by blood and gun powder. He runs to them and he drops to his knees besides Joly. He feels the bile rising to his mouth once again but this time he welcomes the taste as a reminder that pain is everything he'll ever know.

He cries and he shakes the hypochondriac in despair, "No, no. Wake up. Wake up, Joly, you need to heal them. Please. Joly, don't do this." He's growing more and more desperate, trying and pleading and hurting so much.

He screams and he punches Joly on the chest before resting his head on the man's bloodied body. It's not fair. It's so far from fair. 

They were supposed to free themselves but not like this. Never like this. 

He doesn't know how long it's been, but he hears the stairs shrieking again and he looks up to find a bloodied Courfeyrac climbing the stairs.

There's a moment where they look at each other and Grantaire cries even harder and says something like "Courf" and the man runs and crashes into him, griping him tightly and then touching him all over, specially his face and he keeps muttering "There was so much blood, so much, and the cannons came and the barricade fell and Grantaire, Grantaire, Grantaire." 

So he embraces Courfeyrac and holds him until the man stops talking and starts trembling and whimpering. 

He looks at Joly again and even though he is afraid, he is so scared and he had lost so much already, but he asks, "Is there anyone else, Courf?" 

The man's body is limp against Grantaire's, and when he looks up his eyes are dead and his voice is raw, "Jehan was taken to the hospital. Bossuet is in search of Enjolras and Marius. We can't- we can't find them between our brothers." 

Courfeyrac sounds broken and Grantaire thinks that maybe all of them are now reflections of the Musain. Bloodied, falling apart. Destroyed. 

He knows that not finding Enjolras' body should be comforting, but it's not. It could mean anything and by now all he could think was that anything meant death. There’s a moment when he thinks about all the times he said to Enjolras not to do this, to try and find a way to live like everyone else did. Because it would be pointless and it would end badly and the cynic was not sticking around to watch it crumble.

Grantaire will never forgive himself for not fighting along Enjolras. 

He grips at Courfeyrac's shoulders harder than before and stands up, dragging the man with him. He feels the bloodied man breaking at each passing second but he needs Courf and they own his friends this, they own them as much as this.

So he goes to Combeferre and he picks the man's body up. When he has him firmly, he looks at Courfeyrac and motion his head towards Joly.

Courf says, "No, Grantaire, I can't, I can't-" and his eyes are crazy and desperate, begging not to do this, but they have to. They have to, Courf! 

Something flicks between them and Courfeyrac stands up in shaky legs and he hauls the hypochondriac’s corpse to his arms.

They go downstairs and they lay them next to Éponine and Gavroche and they hear before they see him. 

Bossuet screams, "Not him!" and runs to Joly. He passes Grantaire and he ends up shoving the drunkard to the floor, but Grantaire is not going to say a thing. Because Bossuet is taking the man's head in his hands and he cries while shaking Joly, pleading "Wake up, wake up, the floor is dirty and full of germs, get up Joly, don't do this, don't-" and Courfeyrac grips Grantaire's elbow with too much strength but they are hurting so much, there's nothing he can feel other than pain.

And Bossuet kisses Joly. He kisses him several times, shakes his lover and best friend but there's no response. There's nothing.

So Bossuet rests his foreheads on Joly's and he cries until he runs dry. Grantaire and Courfeyrac watch, because they have to. 

While trembling hands, the bald man closes Joly's eyes and kisses him once more before standing up. He wavers a bit but then Courfeyrac is on his left and Grantaire touches his right shoulder. 

Bossuet doesn't acknowledge them. He goes outside and, oh god that's Bahorel, and Grantaire feels his chest tighten because Bahorel is okay. And it’s going to be tough but Jehan might survive, so maybe, maybe they can get him out. Maybe the poet is not gone forever like so many others. And Bossuet may have lost his heart but he's still standing. And damn him if Grantaire is not going to try and keep him up. Courfeyrac is hanging on Grantaire and the drunkard doesn't know if he can give him what he needs. But he'll try. 

There's something growing inside him. He sees now, the future he can't avoid.

And with every passing second, Grantaire feels the fire bursting to life in his stomach. If he's going to try and do this, he can't fail. He can't. 

But he can’t swear in the name of God and definitely not by the stars. 

So he drops on his knees and he takes Combeferre's face between his hands and he fights the bile and the salty tears. He looks and looks and looks and he makes himself a promise not to forget.

"Your sacrifice won't be for nothing. I promise you this, the fight is not over" Grantaire cleans the man's bloodied cheeks and looks at Gavroche's body, so close and so far, feeling a pained smile reach his face. He turns to Courfeyrac and there's Bossuet and Bahorel next to him, and he says, "Long live us." 

His three friends raise their hands to their patches above their hearts and Grantaire follows them, his palm resting on Combeferre's patch and he whispers, "Long live all of you, brothers."

Courfeyrac rests a hand on his shoulder after what feels like hours. The sun has set and they can hear the guard arriving, the floor trembling with the roll of carriages. 

"We have to go," says Courfeyrac and his voice is small and pained.

Grantaire looks up and his eyes are crazed, "We can't leave them, Courf!" 

And he looks at Bossuet and that's a shitty thing to do because he lost so much, so much went away with Joly, but the man sighs and Grantaire realizes he's admitted the defeat. 

"We can't take them with us. We do not have how." 

And it's with a startle that they hear a carriage taking a brusque stop at the Musain entrance. 

Montparnasse and Thénardier climb out and they don't have to say a word, but Thénardier does. "Get them in. As many as you can." 

So Grantaire hauls Combeferre from the floor and Bossuet has Joly on his arms. Thénardier closes his eyes for a few moments before picking Éponine up. He may have never loved her, but he's a father.

Bahorel has Gavroche under an arm and Feuilly in another and that's the first time Grantaire notices Feuilly and it hurts because the man was there and he's dead, the orphan whose mother was Patria.

And Grantaire hadn't seen him, hadn't cried for him.

He does hug Combeferre more tightly against his body and no one says a word. 

They lay their friends side by side inside the carriage and Thénardier says, "You'll see them when the clock rings midnight at the Cimetière Saint Michel." 

Montparnasse starts the carriage and the four revolutionaries watch as they leave. They look at each other and suddenly Grantaire realizes they are actually looking at him and he doesn't know how he became the one to answer to.

Maybe he was the one least shattered. He hadn't seen as each and all of their friends fell, he didn't hear their cries. He was the only one standing. Courfeyrac was gone, no smiles or jokes or flirting inside him. Bossuet lost his heart at the barricade. And Bahorel, their fighter, was defeated.

But Grantaire is restless. There's fight inside him and they feel it and they crave that. He looks at them and they listen, "I know a place where we can try and mend ourselves."

He starts towards a house full of love, a place Éponine once told him about. He slips an arm around Bahorel's shoulders and if Bossuet grips at Courfeyrac's elbow and doesn't let go, no one says a word.

They walk but the shadow of the barricade trails after them.

**Author's Note:**

> this is my first time writing about the barricade boys. i hope i make them justice. please feel free to point out any mistakes, english is not my first language so. yeah. 
> 
> this is part of a series where Grantaire is awesome and the fight continues.


End file.
